


Shared Oxygen

by koi_ling



Series: Nothing Is Gonna Take You from My Side [2]
Category: Winner (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Childhood Friends, Best Friends, Childhood, Gen, Light Angst, Teen Angst, back and forth between present and past i'm sorry, friendly reminder that seungyoon is gay in this story while mino is ?? straight, this is all very disjointed i know, unwanted needs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-19
Updated: 2016-05-19
Packaged: 2018-06-09 10:05:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6901522
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/koi_ling/pseuds/koi_ling
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mino is confused by his needs toward his best friend Seungyoon; an introduction.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shared Oxygen

**Author's Note:**

> I think some stuff will be explained in other parts of this series, meanwhile bear with the lack of info. I hope it'll feel like peeling off an ~~ogre~~ onion.

There has always been something in Seungyoon that Mino can’t quite grasp. Some sort of depth that he can’t reach, no matter how much he tries; a world he can’t touch with his own hands, even when they are skin to skin and sharing the same air.

Mino has learnt that there isn’t much he can do about it. He can only keep staying by his side.

 

 

When they were younger – between kindergarten and primary school – and summer holidays came, Seungyoon and Mino spent most of those sultry afternoons in the courtyard of their housing estate. Green patches stretched among the pebbled paths converging to several towering buildings, forming small oases where the children could play.

Mino literally knew everyone. He could easily find a story to tell about each one of those brats, because he had once played basketball with this one, or repainted the bicycle of that other one… they were his friends, as much as his classmates, and Mino could always be sure to never get bored with them.

But it was natural to have favourites. And Mino’s was Seungyoon.

It had been like that since he could remember. They had been together for all their lives and there was no one that made him feel as comfortable as Seungyoon did. Mino didn’t have to pretend with him, trying to be exaggeratedly funny or cool, because Seungyoon thought he was already the best with no boast or pretence. So he always ended up looking for him, even when the other kids asked him to stay with them.

Seungyoon wasn’t as generally popular as Mino, simply because he wasn’t as eager to please as Mino was – he would play at any kind of game, make conversation, laugh his incredibly high and quirky laugh and all, but he also liked to have some time alone.

Mino knew how much he loved to sneak behind the tall line of the buildings, where the grass grew thicker and the sunlight didn’t reach the ground, caught in all the layers of foliage and branches.

Some kids played there too, in the small park spreading for half a kilometre, but Seungyoon liked to go by himself. He let Mino follow with the promise of being quiet. Sometimes he made him buy two cans of soda in return, but mostly it was Seungyoon himself buying popsicles for the two of them.

They always reached the other end of the park, where a metallic fence ran along the perimeter and divided the estate from a wide field of wasteland.

When they were alone, Mino’s eyes inexorably gravitated toward him. Seungyoon had pale long limbs and nervous red hands, fingers snapping and fidgeting with the stick of his popsicles; and he would always look at the sky with those brown eyes of his, revelling in the poignant quiet that existed in that place. He stood there in a sort of peaceful state of mind while the summer breeze combed through his hair, lost in a maze of thoughts and ideas that Mino couldn’t figure out.

In those moments, Mino knew there was something he couldn’t quite understand in him. Some sort of aloof inscrutable side that lived well beneath everything Mino saw. Under the skin, the flesh, all the muscles and vessels, under the bones, somewhere he couldn’t just reach.

And yet it also soared high, higher than the sky – while Mino kept being on the ground, his two feet deeply rooted in the soil underneath.

Seungyoon would always forget he was there and only remember of Mino after his popsicle had melted in his mouth, covering his lips of a sugary coat. Then he would smile like he had come back from a journey he took only by himself.

 

 

Mino has always found it completely weird and creepy – the need he feels in his guts, the fire coiling inside him along with an irrational anger and want, a _desire_ of owning.

He knows it’s not right, he knows it doesn’t make sense, and he knows he can’t talk about it with anyone. He can’t explain with words what he feels in his heart when he’s left behind, in those moments when Seungyoon lives in a world he can’t see.

He has learnt to accept it, but in the past, when he was younger and he couldn’t hold back as much as he does know, he couldn’t stop the train of thoughts running in his mind. The idea – the craziest, the most irrational of ideas – of slipping his hands around his lean neck; the idea of his fingers clinging onto his skin, bruising, hurting, but just enough to keep him within his reach.

Mino knows it’s batshit insane, and somehow he’s glad that the intensity of that feeling has decreased with time, or maybe he’s just got better at ignoring the need pulsing at the back of his mind. Having a girlfriend has helped him a lot, having other priorities and another circle of friends have taught him how to not depend on Seungyoon every moment of his life.

After all, he’s always been his best friend, and it was natural to want him all for himself when he was a kid. But now they’re grown-ups, and there is no room for such irrationality.

 

 

When they were in seventh grade they had their biggest fight.

Mino wasn’t sure how it started, but he knew the reason behind all of that too well. He was incapable to swallow down that mix of need and jealous he felt. He couldn’t exactly explain what it was, this urge to keep Seungyoon close, to cage him within his hands to be sure he wouldn’t run away – but it was eating him inside like nothing else did, not even his newfound passion for rap music.

That thing he couldn’t grasp, that world flourishing in the dark corners of Seungyoon’s soul, drove Mino crazy. It didn’t help that it was a period of changes, from them getting in two different classes at the beginning of the scholastic year to Mino getting many new friends while Seungyoon tended to keep to himself for some reason.

Mino feared that their lives would take a different course, slowly drifting away from each other to the point they would become two strangers.

“I don’t understand how you can feel this way when I should be the jealous one”, Seungyoon said after they fought for a while, in the same place that had seen them spending many summer afternoons together. “I mean, you’re the one with a lot of new friends, shouldn’t I be the worried one? Can’t you let me breathe a little?”

“I – I’m just scared you” – _you will leave me behind_.

“Are you sure you’re not angry at yourself? Don’t vent your worries on me, when it’s you having a new thrilling life, a gang, a whole new world of – fucking Song Mino, the freshman that would stand up for himself against those bullies of third year, a legend for the whole second floor – people _talk_ about you in my class, I swear”. Seungyoon inhaled deeply, his cheeks flushed for the exertion. “Shouldn’t I fear you will forget about me?”

“I always thought you – you would be fine even by yourself, I guess, that you wouldn’t miss me so much after all”.

Seungyoon looked offended by that preposterous suggestion. “You know I always rely on you and I like to be together any time you want, you are my best friend, Mino. Don’t you forget that. I am always supporting you, even if we can’t be together all the time – I just let you live, and I hope you would do the same to me. As long as you stop annoying the shit out of me for everything I do, I’ll always be by your side”.

 _As long as you let me have this something all by myself, this world you will never see, this whole depth that you will just glimpse and dream of – then we’ll be fine_. Close enough to share the same oxygen, but not that much to let our lungs burn for the need of air.

Mino agreed promptly. Because he couldn’t do anything about it, not when Seungyoon clearly stated he needed that space between them, for living. He is not Mino, who is afraid to be alone, who needs the company of friends, but even more the certainty of being appreciated; no, he chose him as his friend despite that, just because he wanted. It must count for something.

 

 

Mino has found out with time that maybe it wasn’t meant to be. That his need to keep him close is something he had to repress, hide, possibly destroy, because he had no rights on Seungyoon, not even as his best friend. He couldn’t claim anything but his friendship, just like it has always been.

It should be fine that way.

“I’ve found a boyfriend”, Seungyoon says while leaning on their couch, an arm hooked around Mino’s neck, and this shouldn’t affect Mino the way it does, “and he might be _it_ , you know”.

It should be fine this way.


End file.
